John Jackson

“ The principal danger lies in the fact that there are no means of keeping children who write the sloping style fixed in middle position with moderately oblique position of the copy-book; even under the eyes of the teacher, and still more in writing without expert oversight, there appears almost in all scholars a nearly irresistible mania for turning and pushing the copy-book, till the body is twisted in a dangerous way and assumes a posture which seems incredible when seen before one fixed in a photograph. ”

“ One has merely to look through the vast number of (headline) copy books in existence to be struck with the anomalies with which they abound. Every compiler or writer–and there is a material difference between the two–of a series of copy books naturally thinks and advertises his own peculiar production to be the best. But that each should be superior to all the others is impossible, and which amongst them is entitled to lay claim to superiority it is hopeless to attempt to determine. ”

“ Why then, in a subject that pertains to every man's daily life, is it suggested to offer nothing but second- or third-rate models, the creations in great part of ignorant, inexperienced, or unqualified individuals for our children to imitate? A system of this kind will inevitably lower the standard of penmanship and begin a decline in the art of caligraphy; for the removal of an established and high standard, and the substitution of an imperfect and inferior standard, can only be followed by one result, and that a fatally disastrous one. ”

“ Every teacher knows how much patience and lung-power the constant injunctions to sit straight demand, how much time is thereby taken away from the proper tasks of instruction, and how nevertheless after a short period the children always sink back again into those bodily distortions with which we are all so familiar, as if a strong magnet were dragging down their heads towards the left side of the copy-book. ”

“ Ought not our Bureau of Education, our School Superintendents, our School Boards and beyond all our School Teachers themselves to take vigorous and immediate action in a matter fraught with such grave issues? Delay is dangerous, indifference is criminal and inaction equally fatal, both as to bodily health and our standard of writing as a National accomplishment. ”

“ The sole question about which we have to concern ourselves is "Which is the best? What or which is the better or best System and Style of writing? Are the down strokes to be Upright or Sloping? Shall we have Vertical or Oblique writing? If the latter what degree of slope is the best, what shall be the standard angle?" ”

“ The worst of it is that every child very soon gets accustomed to his own peculiar cramped way of sitting, which he always resumes during the many hundred writing lessons of his school-life, so that always the same organs are again burdened and the same functions hindered. Everyone thinks chiefly of the dangers of short-sight and crooked growth; scarcely less prejudicial is the hindrance to full respiration and the impeding of the circulation of the blood in the organs of the lower body, with all their consequences, into the details of which we cannot enter here. ”

“ It certainly would seem to the ordinary intelligence that if any given teacher were either too indifferent or too busy to use the Blackboard in class when enjoying the substantial aid of Headline Copy Books, it will be still more unlikely or still more impracticable for him when deprived of that aid and when burdened with the extra duty of compiling, arranging, and setting the copies himself. Surely it is difficult to conceive how when a teacher through overwork is obliged to omit certain items, we are to secure the performance of those items by increasing his work and multiplying its details. ”

“ That these Hygienic principles should be an integral part of any system of penmanship whatever, there cannot be the shadow of a doubt, but it may be emphatically stated that the existing style of oblique or slant writing has been elaborated not only independently, but in spite of every physiological demand. Awkward and painful postures have always accompanied the practice of sloping writing. It is more than surprising that such injurious distortions should ever have been for one moment tolerated, but the power or dominance of fashion over our minds is incredibly imperious and overwhelming. ”

“ Is there any conceivable cause why a lazy or stupid child, who will not take the trouble to look at and try to imitate a headline under his very eyes and only two or three inches from his pen, will exert himself still more energetically to refer to and try to imitate a copy ten to twenty feet distant from him? ”

“ Of course, and evidently, the first and one of the gravest defects in Blank Copying Books is the absence of Perfect or Accurate Copies and the presence of nothing save Imperfect and Inaccurate Models. Pupils are to have plain-ruled books in order to fill them up with approximate imitations of the defective Blackboard models. They are never to see anything outside these blank books but the very imperfect writing–often indeed little better than caricatures of their respective teachers. They are never to see anything inside their books but their own faulty and distorted outlines. ”

“ Is it not true that pupils almost uniformly tilt up their books to an angle sufficient to give verticality (optically considered) to the down strokes, and will hold the pen as vertical writers hold it in spite of the repeated commands of their teachers to the contrary?
A pupil is restless and changes his posture or inclination to the desk and his Copy Book faithfully records the incident by a painfully apparent break in the parallelism of the writing, or he tilts his book or straightens it and the same undesirable phenomenon is presented. ”

“ And passing from the schoolroom where such an anomalous and chaotic state of things prevails into the world outside, this is exactly what meets us. We can only describe the penmanship of the present age as a dreary waste of slightly variegated illegibility relieved here and there at long intervals by welcome exceptions of readable writing. In view of what reaches one continually by the post we may denounce the writing that obtains now-a-days as miserably poor and painfully illegible. ”

“ During all these years the victim has never seen a specimen of perfect writing, and the models that he has seen have varied repeatedly, sometimes carefully written, sometimes otherwise;–different teachers, varying and conflicting methods, diverse styles, unequal lengths of loops, contradictory principles of construction and junction! the unhappy pupil is bewildered and overwhelmed in a sea of such inconsistencies, his writing is cramped and weak, and most probably ruined for all future time. ”

“ It is a very common delusion that “Anybody can write” and the notion is most prevalent amongst Secondary School teachers many of whom give the subject hardly a place in their Routine or Curriculum. It is an equally deplorable fact that hardly anybody does write either as he might or as he should, and yet the efficient and successful teaching of writing in a school is frequently the most potent factor in its success. ”

“ There is no artificial or abnormal positions of head, trunk, arm, hand and pen to teach and secure, for every child will naturally assume the right posture; the book lies evenly on the desk and the writing follows the one direction of the vertical instead of the legion of angles of direction peculiar to and inseparable from the oblique. The difficulties of both teacher and pupil are reduced to the lowest and so far as they can be, writing and the teaching of writing are pleasant factors in the daily routine. ”

“ We confess our inability to discover where the virtue of thick writing lies; the light-stroke writers are quicker and better in their work; and the thin writing, or the caligraphy that consists of one almost uniform thickness, is quite as legible as any other Teachers should teach a free light style of writing, guarding their pupils against hard downstrokes, the result will then be better work and less labour. ”

“ Of equal value is the consideration that this greater ease is carried outside and beyond the mere teaching and learning of the art. To the Vertical Writer no weariness or "writers' cramp" will ensue from any ordinary or even extraordinary exercise of his art. The task of writing is proceeded with under the best conditions possible and thus it comes to pass that Upright Penmanship is not only taught in about half the time that the oblique style needs, but that it makes a much smaller demand upon the energy or working power of the ordinary writer to produce. ”

“ Exception must at once be taken to this watchword phrase as it is ambiguous and delusive, because it insinuates that Blackboard teaching is as scarce an element in to-day's system and practice as the Blank Copy Books are, which is contrary to fact. Every teacher knows that Blackboard demonstration and illustration are an essential factor in existing methods of teaching writing with Headline Copy Books. Every Training College inculcates it. Every Educational Manual imperatively prescribes it, and every true teacher to the full extent of his ability and opportunity practises it. ”

“ To hear the several champions hold forth on the claims of their respective outlines one might imagine that there were numerous vital questions involved in the discussion, whilst in fact there is nothing but the most trivial of differences and the most imperceptible of advantages on either side. Both forms are good as initial, medial or final, and what the first or script form boasts of in the matter of speed–for it is undoubtedly more quickly made than its rival–is counteracted to a great extent by its inferiority as to legibility when in union with certain other letters. ”

“ Perpendicular Writing, on the other hand, can only be produced in straight middle-position, and so gives a guarantee that the children will be preserved in the preparation of their home-lessons also from the bad cramped postures which threaten health in so many ways. The Hygiene of the home-work forms an exceedingly important section of school organization, but lies, in the nature of the case, to a great extent beyond our influence.
We are deprived of the possibility of securing for the child in its parents’ house, good light, a writing-desk suited to its stature, and a well-ventilated room ”

“ With parents (who constitute the public so far as schools are concerned) beautifully written Copy books and carefully written Home Exercises are not only evidence of satisfactory progress but they are regarded as an index to the discipline of the school, the thoroughness of the teaching, the neatness and precision of the general work and to the Education imparted. Very few teachers appear to apprehend or rightly value both the extern and intern influence which writing exerts on a School. ”

“ In the diary of the private individual, the correspondence of everyday life, the records of business transactions, the literature of the author, the briefs of the barrister or the manuscripts of the Theologian and Ecclesiastic writing is equally essential and universal. Not only is it thus all pervasive throughout civilised society it rises to even greater prominence and significance in the case of the hundreds of thousands who as secretaries, copyists or clerks follow writing as their profession or business, and derive from it their sole means of subsistence. ”

“ Is there not rather every reason to conclude, that a page of blank book writing will, as it proceeds downwards, deteriorate in a much greater degree than a page of Headline writing, where the writer can hardly avoid looking at the perfect model times and again whilst the lines are being written? ”

“ And this hypothesis—viz. of a standard system of penmanship—is not chimerical, it is logical and practical. Whilst however the present custom obtains, and in our schools every teacher exercises his own independent and uninstructed mind, teaching from any one of the multifarious headline Copy books that may strike his fancy or what is far worse from his own peculiar style and the black-board, what wonder if the caligraphy of the age is the laughing-stock of the age! ”

“ The writing, and not the writer, has always been the supreme consideration in the growth of the art of penmanship. A certain style of writing was deemed or decreed to be essential, the idea of protest was never entertained, and our ancestors had to bend cringe and twist under the system of bondage thus established. ”

“ A second minor difficulty is the position of the Blackboard in relation to the several pupils in the class. It is a fact that in many schools the light is bad, and where it is good, myopia or shortsight, that obtains so generally amongst schoolchildren, will involve us in the same embarrassment. What shall be done with these shortsighted pupils that are always to be found in every standard of an elementary School? They are at a grave disadvantage unless special provision be made for them. ”